There have been multiple accusations of the same corruption and bribery here in the US. City and state politicians have been giving WalMart special dispensation, tax incentives and fast tracked building permits in nearly every city and state WalMart has built their stores and distribution centers in.
I wrote a diary the other day about how states are giving special tax deals to corporations and allowing corporations to keep their employee's state income taxes.
Most commenters dismissed this kind of special treatment as normal practice and well within the state's politician's powers.
Isn't thIs the same thing. We call it bribery and corruption when Mexico does it because any cash that changes hands goes directly to the politicians.
In the US, that money is called campaign contributions instead of bribes and the cash is laundered through what Americans fondly call campaign accounts.
The US has legalized a bribe by changing the name to campaign contribution.
A politician directly accepting money in exchange for special consideration or treatment is considered a bribe and is illegal in the US.
But a politician indirectly accepting money via a campaign contribution and then rewarding those contributors with special consideration is considered politics and is completely legal.
The US has even legitimized the brokers of these bribes with a name. They are called corporate lobbyists. If corporate lobbyists are not seducing favors from politicians with promises of future campaign contributions or with threats of ending current campaign contributions what are they doing?
When an American politician rewards a corporation with special treatment we call it an ear mark, subsidy or incentive and whether that corporation is a large campaign contributor is rarely if ever taken into consideration. It's rationalized and justified with promises of adding jobs, increasing security or in the public interest. Furthermore the rationale is usually foreshadowed with pending doom against inaction.
But when a Mexican politician rewards a corporation with special treatment, Americans call it corruption.
What an example we are setting.